The Words of the Mouth

by Ronald Smith

  ******

  There was a terrible shortage of dope in Edinburgh; none of my friends had any, so I decided to travel down to Manchester on my own and score enough to make up the money we had wasted on the London jaunt.

  My contact in Manchester, Brian, who was taking me to a dealer he knew, had been busted two weeks previously and was completely eaten up with paranoia as a consequence. He told me nervously that there was a National Drug Squad Conference in Manchester that very week, which very soon infected me with a similar apprehension; I began to worry that I would be seen and recognised by Edinburgh cops who knew me.

  He was driving me across town to the dealer, and I was counting my money, when he pulled out his own wad and thumped it on my lap, saying, "Count it again. This guy won't stand any messing about; everything's got to be perfect,"

  I was becoming really annoyed at the funk he was in, but I said nothing.

  I was counting both lots of notes, my lap covered with hundreds of pounds, when I glanced out of the side window.

  Alongside was a car full of plainclothes policemen, looking over at us.

  I looked to the front, and there was another carload of cops; and right behind us was yet a third car full of them: we were surrounded by four or five cars full of drag squad police.

  I glanced anxiously at my driver who was intent on the traffic, he hadn't noticed them yet, and 1 knew that if I mentioned it, he would be out of the car and running.

  "Listen," I said vehemently, in my best Edinburgh criminal accent, "you just keep your eyes to the front and don't even look around; one move and I'll chib ya. There's cops beside us."

  He started trembling, and gibbered, "I don't wanna get busted, I don't wanna get busted, oh god, I don't wanna…

  "Shut up, you bastard, don't move, just keep driving," I snarled.

  He turned right, and miraculously all the police cars swept on ahead, going on to their conference.

  The deal cost more than it was supposed to have, taking all my cash, but I still had my return ticket for the train to Edinburgh, so I said to Brian: "Just drop me at the station. Don't worry, I'll get back OK."

  I had forgotten that the railwaymen had declared a national go-slow because of an industrial dispute, and when I strode, up to the guard and said, "Where's the train to Edinburgh?" he looked at me incredulously.

  "You must be bloody joakin, mate!"

  "What do you mean?"

  "There's a bloody go-slow on. There hasn't been a bloody train through here for hours."

  I looked around: hundreds of agitated people were milling about; the station was in chaos.

  I cursed with annoyance: I had only five bob left in my pocket, I didn't know where in Manchester my friend stayed, I had been without sleep for two days and was beginning to come down with flu, the city was teeming with drug squad cops, and I was carrying a plastic Marks and Spencers bag containing three weights of hashish.

  I turned to the guard. "Well, can I get further up the line?"

  "You can take the commuter train." He indicated the platform. I stepped onto a train that was just leaving, now totally paranoid, and desperate to get home. In the next station, I was able to get another commuter train, and another, and eventually reached Preston, feeling wretchedly ill and wound up with nerves because of what I was carrying.

  To my horror, the station at Preston was full of troops embarking for Northern Ireland, and dozens of policemen were in the crowd. Outside, the rain lashed down. There was a near panic atmosphere among the hundreds of people, some of whom had been waiting ten hours for a train from London; nobody knew where his train was leaving from, as trains were coming into the wrong platforms, and not running according to schedule.

  Amid this pandemonium, I saw a drunken Scot lurching along the platform; he was trying to sell, or give, steaks to people, from a bag of frozen meat he had stolen from somewhere. Because he was so disgustingly drunk, nobody would go near him, so I attached myself to him for several hours; in my state of mind, he seemed to offer some cover or protection; a familiar voice, at least.

  Finally, to my immense relief, the train from London arrived and I managed to struggle aboard. But when we reached Carlisle, a guard announced, "Everybody off! This is as far as we're going!"

  I staggered from the train, now dazed and dizzy with flu and exhaustion; everything had gone so wrong so fast; I was convinced that my arrest and imprisonment were imminent. But I simply had to sleep, so I went into the station buffet, which is a large one, and had at least five hundred people crowded into it; I collected three empty chairs from various tables and lined them up to make a bed; then I stretched out with the bag of dope as a pillow.

  A nightmare ensued. I was driving a car very fast, too fast. Ahead of me, someone was on a zebra crossing and I ran him down. I woke, screaming, and fell off the chairs. I didn't know where I was, and hundreds of people were looking at me.

  'Oh, my God,' I thought in dismay, 'the dope !'

  I snatched up the bag and ran headlong out of the buffet, to see a train at the platform, about to leave.

  1 jumped aboard. The train, I discovered, was going non-stop to Inverness. Thank goodness! Back in Scotland.

  But at Motherwell, the engine caught fire and it stopped; desperately, I jumped off and ran along the platform to a blue line commuter train leaving for Glasgow, the only one of the day.

  The sliding doors were just closing as I ran up to it; I swung the bag of dope between them; they caught it and automatically slid open again.

  When I arrived in Glasgow, there were mobs of clamouring, shoving people thronging the station, and one train about to leave for Edinburgh. I managed to get aboard, but even the corridors were jammed with standing passengers.

  By this time I had been eighteen hours in the trains and I couldn't face standing; I pushed my way into the first class carriage and to my amazement found it completely empty. I went into one of its compartments and relaxed, my feet up on the seat.

  Then I saw a guard go by; noticing me, he stopped and came back, pulling the door open. "Ticket, please."

  I sat up defiantly. "Listen, mate, before you start, I haven't got a first-class ticket. I've been on the trains for eighteen hours now because of your go-slow, and I don't mind. But do you know what this strike is about? It's about first and second class citizens; it's about first and second class tickets. So if you start on me about this bloody ticket…”

  “Don't you worry about that, mate," he exclaimed with fraternal warmth, clasping my hand and shaking it strongly, "If anybody comes along, you just tell 'em that Jock the Guard says you can sit there."

  At Haymarket, I rushed out and caught a taxi, arriving at Mairi's flat in an elated, exhilarated state; we went straight out in the car and sold all the dope in three hours.

  Then I collapsed in bed for a week.